I have taken note of Giovanni Bonello’s latest self righteous tirade (The Sunday Times of Malta, May 19).

I have also taken note of his failure to address the issues pointed out by me and the evident errors he fell into when citing the Constitution. The only half hearted concession of his errors appears to be where he apologetically, without of course apologising, states that at the President’s Forum he could only, “at best give a rather summary abstract” of his reasoning – ­as if summing up exempts you from the need to be precise especially when it is used as a licence to denigrate and insult others.

He refers the reader to his online paper entitled The Supremacy Delusion, apparently for a more precise and fuller rendering of his views. I had already seen that paper and must confess I did not notice any substantial difference between it and his other contributions; it is all very much the same diatribe thinly disguised as legal discourse repeating the same errors.

In that paper he relegates without comment the significant exception in Article 116 of the Constitution, regarding invalidity on grounds of inconsistency with the human rights provisions, to simply a brief footnote – when his criticism of the Constitutional Court’s position is exclusively based precisely on its judgments falling in that excepted category.

I have noted as well Bonello’s belief that the press is not the right place for informed dialogue on legal matters but is the right place for browbeating pontification, insults, abuse, slander and invective.

There is therefore not much point in my trying to engage in or aspire to a mutually respectful rational debate and I shall consequently desist since I have no desire or inclination to adopt the style Bonello seems to relish, a style which mistakes vituperation for wit.

Incidentally, Chief Justice John Marshall cited in the inscription which accompanied Bonello’s write-up was clearly mistaken: evidently it is not up to the judicial department to say what the law is, but up to Bonello, who appears to be even superior to the supremacy of the Constitution which, in consonance with Chief Justice Marshall’s dictum, lays down that it is up to the Constitutional Court to say what the position under the Constitution is.